All but written off 12 days ago by some, the Milwaukee Brewers made a statement this week:

The National League Central is their division, and they don't plan on letting anyone take it from them.

That their three-game sweep knocked the Cincinnati Reds into fourth place and 4.5 games back only proved the Brewers' point further.

St. Louis had a chance -- leading by half a game after the Brewers' loss Sunday -- but has since lost three in row. Holding tight to first place, the Brewers have won three straight and boosted their lead back up to 2.5 games.

With winnable series against the Mets and Rays ahead, the Brewers' midseason woes could be all but forgotten by August.

And as terrible as things looked during a stretch of 11 losses in 12 games, they have looked equally promising this week as Milwaukee now has won fives times in its last seven games.

After battling through a slump for much of June, right fielder Ryan Braun has been swinging a hot bat of late, hitting .385/.467/.692 over the last seven games with a pair of home runs, two doubles and eight RBIs. Braun's success in the middle of the lineup is hugely important to the Brewers' ability to sustain late-season and postseason success.

Each of the last two days, catcher Jonathan Lucroy and slugger Mark Reynolds showed signs of breaking out of slumps of their own.

Following a 3-for-30 stretch, Lucroy has gone 4-for-8 with two home runs Tuesday night, including the walk-off blast. Reynolds snapped his 3-for-38 funk with three hits, including a pair of homers in Wednesday's game.

The right-hander joined the Brewers bullpen this week after lighting up Triple-A, and promptly did the same to the radar gun at Miller Park in a dominant ninth inning. Jeffress -- once suspended 100 games for substance abuse and cut earlier this season by the Blue Jays -- topped 97-mph with ease and hit triple digits to close out the game.

Jeffress looks like exactly the right-handed power arm the Milwaukee bullpen needs, without the high cost of a trade-deadline deal. If Jeffress can keep his strikeout numbers up and walks down, the Brewers will have gotten themselves a steal.

With the offense rolling again and pitching staff limiting the Reds to just six runs in the series, the Brewers once again resemble a team poised to make a deep postseason run.

TOP TWEETS

Brewers prospect Gilbert Lara, just 16 years old, put on an impressive show at Miller Park this week.

In addition to rebuilding their NL Central lead, the Brewers' playoff odds once again are the best in the division, according to Fangraphs. Milwaukee is projected to win 86 games with a 57.6 percent chance of reaching the postseason.

The season-to-date stats model favors the Crew even more, projecting them to win 88 games with 64.7 percent odds, the fourth best in the National League.

Over at MLB.com, the Baseball Prospectus model gives the Brewers a 66 percent chance, compared to the Cardinals' 56 percent odds. Milwaukee had dropped to 47 percent in that model as recently as Sunday.

STAT OF THE WEEK

2000. Games played by Aramis Ramirez, making him the 14th active player to reach the milestone. Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter leads all active players with 2691. No active Brewers player has played in more games than Ramirez.

BEST INSTAGRAMS

Shane Krutchen of Oshkosh, a combat veteran, shared this photo from before Friday's game. As part of the Wounded Warriors Project, Krutchen and Brian Schultz of Wisconsin Dells got to travel with the Brewers and suit up for batting practice.

Bullpen catcher Marcus Hanel did some sightseeing over the weekend in Washington.

Bernie Brewer looks like he's ready for the Wisconsin State Fair.

THEY SAID IT

Lucroy: "Sometimes things don't go your way in the game, and that was just a couple weeks where we just were battling out and things didn't roll the way that we wanted them too. But you know what, that's the way the game works, and whenever you're a better team, things tend to go your way more often."

Carlos Gomez on making the playoffs: "It means everything. Because that's why we're here for. We're not here for just our individual numbers, we're here just to go to the playoffs, win the World Series. That's why every team has a team, because they want to win the World Series."

Aramis Ramirez: "We're in a pennant race. You don't need any more motivation than that. We're in first place, we got 60-plus games to go. We just got to bring our A-game every single day and try to win the game."